the squids

One of our favourite discoveries of the past year has been golden milk for breakfast. Especially in the winter this is a lovely alternative to tea for the small ones, and they love grinding the cardamom up in the mortar & pestle and adding the neon turmeric (200ml milk, 1/4 tsp turmeric, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp raw honey, 3 cardamom pods ground/crushed. warm through, strain and serve). Ever since the kids were teeny I've made a point of telling them about the different powers carried by the food they eat, it helps to add both wonder and reason to meals - avocados make your hair sparkle and shine, tomatoes help to keep your skin safe from the sun, lentils make your brain and muscles strong, bananas help you to have sweet dreams... etc. Turmeric is worshipped as a superfood, coming into your body to help fight off bugs and keep you at your sharpest. We incorporated our golden milk and all its powers into a yummy twisted bun, after being inspired by a pre Christmas post from Twigg Studios. These are another easy one for kids to prepare, delicious for breakfast if you can get out of bed on time, or as a handy snack. We were all off to the women's march in London the next morning and needed something to set us up and to pack for snacks through the day. I've also adapted them to make a gluten free golden muffin. Both are sugar & dairy free (substitute coconut oil if you don't have butter).

Warm the milk, turmeric and cardamom in a pan until hot but not bubbling. Strain into a jug and top up to 350ml with cold water. Add the dry ingredients to a bowl and mix, then add your golden milk little by little whilst mixing. This is a fun pouring/mixing one for kids, but be careful as turmeric definitely stains anything and everything a lovely fluoro yellow! The dough needs to be mixed and kneaded until it isn't too sticky, without adding more than a sprinkle more flour. Let the kids loose to pummel it for a good five minutes, then pop it in the fridge in an oiled tupperware/covered bowl overnight. If you don't want the buns for breakfast you can just leave it to rise for an hour or two somewhere warm until doubled in size. I like how this is easily split into two parts as it helps with short attention spans. We made the dough as a group after school, then split it in half and each family tackled the bun prep the next morning separately.

Next morning, remove the dough from the fridge. Because it is cold it will be easier to work with. lightly flour a surface and roll your dough out into a large rectangle(ish) shape - my kids are competitive roller-outers so we made two smaller rectangles, which is also fine. Mix together your coconut sugar and cinnamon, and pop the melted butter/coconut oil into a little dish. Use a pastry brush to coat the pastry with melted butter, then sprinkle the cinnamon mix over the dough rectangle (or one of them, if you've made two). Fold your rectangle in half and press the edges together. If you have made the two smaller rectangles, simply place one on top of the other and seal the edges.

Once you have a single rectangle of dough filled with cinnamony goodness, use a sharp knife to slice the dough into strips lengthways, approx a thumb-width. My kids are allowed to use certain kitchen knives and the dough should be easy to safely slice with supervision. Take a strip and twist it at either end to make it spiral, then wrap it into a little bun shape. The shape you end up with isn't important, as they all taste delicious regardless. Just make sure the edges are tucked in and it's nice and plump. Place the buns on a tray lined with parchment.

Place your bun tray somewhere warm for 30-60 mins whilst the buns prove. In the meantime heat the oven to 180C. The buns will be ready to go in when they have plumped up. A good way to test is to poke them gently with a finger - if the indentation slowly fills back out they are good to go. A quick bounce-back or no bounce back at all indicate over or under proved dough. Brush the buns with some beaten egg or double cream (or a mix of the two!) and sprinkle with some more coconut sugar and/or fennel seeds before putting into the oven. For vegan egg wash use 2 parts nut milk to one part agave syrup.

the gluten free muffin version on the left, original golden milk bun on the right

Bake the buns for 20 mins, until they are golden brown. Whilst mine baked I made a gluten free variation, since having regular wheat flour makes me swell up like a super unsexy balloon... recipe below.

In a large bowl, combine yeast and sugar. Warm the milk with the cardamom pods and turmeric, then strain and return to the pan, adding the butter and warming through to melt it. Add the golden milk/butter combo to the yeast/sugar mix. Leave to get a bit bubbly. Whisk dry ingredients together, then add the remaining wet ingredients (including the egg) to the milk/butter combo. Whisk together then add to the dry ingredients. Beat or mix together until it becomes a coherent dough and is no longer insanely sticky. Try to avoid adding more flour. At this stage I placed my dough in the fridge overnight with the golden bun dough. The dough is much easier to deal with once it's cold. If you prefer you can use it immediately.

gluten free roll out...

Roll out your dough into a large rectangle - if it feels very sticky you may want to do this with some parchment above and below. We just about coped without. Brush the dough with melted butter and sprinkle on the cinnamon/sugar mixture, as with the buns. Fold over to make one lovely filled rectangle. Cut into strips as with the buns, but slightly thicker strips this time and bear in mind they will be fragile. Roll them up into a swirl, as pictured above, and place in a cupcake case in a muffin tin. Leave to prove for 20 mins. Brush with egg wash and sprinkle with fennel seeds if desired. Bake for 15 -20 minutes at 180C, until golden. These are seriously delicious...

We ate about three buns each (!) for breakfast with butter and bacon (!) and packed the rest into a little rucksack to take on the march. Such a yummy all day long treat. Feeling proud of the small folk for both their baking and sign-making skills...

It's been a hundred years since the last recipe post, sort of because winter, sort of because cakes... and much bigger children whose days are spent at school and whose evenings are mostly for sluggishly dragging themselves about looking exhausted and shovelling snacks into their mouths before passing out. No more golden mid-morning hours spent recipe testing with bright eyed assistants. But I miss it and it's important and once they get going they love it, so I'm taking a stand and bringing it back. My stand has been encouraged by magical Hattie Garlick, equally keen to come up with recipes and ways to engage children with food and meals, and encourage some genuine healthy meal enjoyment without being a total pain in the ass, resorting to bribery, ending up in tears etc. We don't want to buy expensive, aggressively marketed soulless snacks. We don't want to spend our evenings silently weeping as we scrape uneaten dishes into the compost. Back in the day children were a valuable extra pair of hands in the kitchen, and food preparation would be something they inevitably helped with and earned respect for. It encourages a connection to what's on the plate, an understanding of what ingredients do and why they're involved, and gives children the power to experiment and exert some control over their own supper. Glistening with all these grand ideas, we decided to drag five slightly-tired children together on a rainy afternoon in the midst of dry January and order them to whip us up some supper. On the menu...

Rainbow Gnocchi

this amount makes enough for 4 small servings of the red (beetroot), yellow (saffron) and green (spinach) gnocchi. You can either multiply the amounts to make different colours/flavours (it freezes well and cooks easily from frozen, so making lots is a good idea) or divide your dough before adding the flavours/colours. Recipe for the orange (sweet potato) gnocchi is below.

For both the regular and sweet potato gnocchi, mix your ingredients together in a big bowl to make a dough. This is why gnocchi is so great for kids - it couldn't be much simpler. Bigger kids can flex their maths muscles and help with weighing out the ingredients, and smaller ones can add and mix and mash. Kids are great at breaking eggs (accurately, for the most part...kind of) and love to measure things. Once you have your dough vaguely mixed, split it into portions for adding flavour (set the sweet potato dough aside - it's done for now). We gave each child a bowl of dough, with the smallest two on a team, and a dough colour each. Pre-wilt the spinach by placing it in a colander and pouring over boiling water, then squeeze out as much liquid as possible and chop - or have a small person chop. Add to one portion of dough with a little squeezy garlic and a pinch of salt and pepper. Mix well and form into a ball. For the beetroot powder we added approx a tablespoon (kids in charge!) and for the saffron we dissolved a pinch in a little warm water and mixed it in.

The dough should be not too sticky, and lovely to squash. Add more flour a bit at a time until it feels right. You need a liberal dusting of flour (and tolerance for some fairly epic mess) before asking the kids to roll their balls of dough into long dough snakes. Then dole out some lovely sharp knives for them to cut thumb-sized dough nuggets. With supervision and appropriate sizes, knife wielding children needn't be an issue, and they love being given the responsibility.

Actual real life ragamuffins

Place your gnocchi nuggets on a plate and keep them in the fridge until ready to cook. I found it helpful to dust them in a little polenta flour to help prevent sticking, as there were so many! With kids in charge they do look a bit bonkers and are not uniform, but this only adds to their charm. Probably. When you are ready to cook, boil a big pot of salted water and pop the gnocchi in ten-ish at a time - don't overcrowd. They are ready when they float to the top, and must be removed with a slotted spoon and placed on a muslin/paper towel for the liquid to drain off. They only take about 2 minutes to cook so you do have to stay close by. As mentioned they cook well straight from the freezer too. To serve melt some butter in a frying pan - for extra yum add some sage leaves or torn pieces of cavolo nero (or both) and fry them briefly. Then add the gnocchi, shake it all about and place in bowls. Top with grated parmesan or pecorino. This was a hit with all our ages, with the absolute top fave flavour being...SPINACH! It is still discussed for its deliciousness.

During the ensuing dinner party we asked the kids what they would like to call their new little cooking club. Although there was huge support for "Wee Wee Bum Bum Poo Poo" they settled on the Dough Nuts, probably hoping that this meant they would get to eat some. And maybe they will... We will be back hopefully fairly regularly with more yummy kid-cook friendly recipes they will actually want to eat, and you will want them to eat. Now I'm off to try and scrape dried gnocchi dough from my table...

We made these ages and ages ago, before it was even properly summer. But then the sunshine swept us up and we were so busy barrelling about watching our skin turn golden and eating way too many ice creams...this little recipe was all but forgotten. Today the radio is warning of heavy showers and cold northwesterly winds and the return of the cloudy days, and I remembered.

this boy is pure gold

This was a last minute panic bake in a wild attempt to lift us all out of the dumps the last time the weather had us low. I am really mean about buying snacks in, as I resent how much they cost and how little goodness they ever contain, and loathe the sneaky marketing to (my poor, desperate to eat them all) children. I always have the best intentions to make a larder full of snacks instead but hardly ever manage, and we mostly exist on fruit and toast between meals. With zero prep allowed we had to come up with a recipe based on what we had in the house. I scraped together the basics for a gluten free cake and let the kids improvise the rest. The resulting muffins were completely delicious, totally moist and sweet despite being gluten and sugar free. You could make them dairy free by substituting the butter for coconut oil, I imagine. Please let me know if you give it a try. The sun broke through as soon as we had these baked, just like it always does eventually... but Pablo's name stuck, partly because of their cloudy texture.

Heat the oven to 170C. In a large bowl whisk together all the dry ingredients. In the bowl of a stand mixer whip up the butter until it's fluffy, then add the syrups, then the egg. Mix until well incorporated. In a blender or food processor whizz together your fruit and rice milk (any milk would work) with your vanilla & chia seeds, plus the beetroot powder if you want your muffins pink. In a further bowl whisk the egg whites until stiff.

Alternate adding the dry ingredients and the milky fruitshake mix to the butter/syrup combo. Once all is well mixed in, fold in the whipped egg whites. Pop the mix into muffin cases and bake for 15 mins in preheated oven. Leave to cool on a wire rack. We were still eating these two days later and they were still moist and yummy, but you could definitely pop some in the freezer and add to lunch boxes. We didn't make any icing, just topped with some sheep's yogurt and cherries or raspberries. They are especially yummy for breakfast, and filling too. I imagine this recipe would also be fab for a gluten/sugar free birthday cake though we are yet to try it. Would love to try some flavour variations also, I bet they would be lovely with banana and cacao... or apricots and blackberries....

The days seem suddenly longer and lighter, and we had already taken for granted that after school would once more mean lolling in the park, skateboarding down hills and demanding ice creams that we would never EVER finish (ahem...), working on our chasing and catching skills, and casually topping up our suntans. But today there was hail. HAIL. In late April. So we had a little family cooking & music session...

In light of Prince sadly popping up to the stars on Friday/because it was a rad excuse to dig out my Purple Rain vinyl & inflict it on the kids/because our Abel & Cole veggie box delivered us a big bag of them that urgently needed eating, we settled on using our purple potatoes. My kids are strange, in that they will happily devour mountains of raw greens or pull apart big scary prawns, but aren't very happy about eating potatoes in any form other than deep fried. Blue chips seemed like a cop out, so we thought we would experiment with a purple gnocchi supper.

Gluten Free Purple Gnocchi

In an ideal world, your first step would be to bake your purple potatoes for 45ish mins, then scoop out the flesh into a bowl. This retains maximum purpleness and keeps everything nice and dry. We were nowhere near as organised, and only had 30 mins before tummies were going to start demanding to be filled, so we peeled, boiled and drained ours extremely well. Both kids are very into peeling veg at the moment, because they are mad, so loved labouring over each potato whilst I silently panicked over how long it was taking them. Once your potato is skin free, cooked and in a bowl, whatever the method, mash well and add 1/3 cup of flour - we went gluten free with Doves Farm's plain gf blend, but I reckon rice flour would work well or you can use regular plain flour if you're not fussed about gluten content. Also add one small egg - cracking the eggs is easy and fun for kids so I always let them do this bit and they rarely get egg everywhere or any shell in the bowl. Add a couple of pinches of salt (& pepper if you like).

Indy peeling spuds...

The mashing of the ingredients is another bit the kids can totally take over on. Basically with this meal they are doing the lot, so you can sit back and relax (unless you are too busy taking pictures, like me....) The mixture quickly comes together into a lovely satisfying dough which Indy very accurately compared to play doh. Separate into 4 separate pieces and roll each one out into a long snake - another job for the kids - then cut each snake into bite size nuggets. The texture makes this a really easy job for the kids to practice using a proper knife, and much was their glee at being trusted with something sharp and grown-up.

Once the nuggets are chopped, roll a fork over them to make them look lovely and authentic and gnocchiesque. Or, if you are doing this with kids, give up on that and accept that they will all be totally different shapes and sizes and degrees of squashedness, but will nevertheless taste the same.

Add your beautiful misshapen purple nuggets to boiling salted water and wait for them to float to the surface and tell you they're done, which takes approximately a minute, so don't wander off. Drain immediately and serve with something buttery, or we made a quick pesto from fresh basil, toasted pine nuts, olive oil & some goat's cheese. Devoured. Prince would totally not approve, because he was a vegan, but I'm sure there's an easy vegan version of this...

I actually have gone bananas, because *still* rarely a night passes without Indy padding down the hall and squirrelling in next to me, using me as a pillow and wrapping herself around me like a little butterscotchy octopus. Then I can't get back to sleep. And she wriggles the covers off. And in the morning I feel like lying on the floor with a funnel in my mouth whilst someone fills me to the brim with coffee. Or waves a one way ticket to a Mexico in front of my face. It's January, so even the brightest days are mostly dark and frosty and I'm not a fan of long spells of hibernation, I need some sun and air and adventure. So we have been baking a lot to make the house smell of cinnamon and warmth, and keep away from watching too much tv or feeling too blue.

This banana bread is our latest invented recipe and we are all now total addicts. It's delicious straight from the oven or cold or toasted with butter or slathered in almond butter and raspberries for breakfast. We're on a loaf a week at the moment and show no signs of slowing down. But it's totally sugar/gluten/dairy free so we can smugly devour as much as we fancy & get ourselves strong for treeclimbing season at the same time...

This one is lovely and easy for kids to help with. Pablo's just getting into maths so loves to measure the ingredients, and Indy is always keen to sneak licks of spoons when my back is turned. Line a loaf tin with parchment in the bottom, and butter/coconut oil the sides (indy does this by painting with a pastry brush). Mash the bananas in a bowl, then add all other wet ingredients *except the egg whites*. Mix all dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then combine the two. Whip the egg whites into soft peaks and very carefully fold into the mixture.

Bake in a preheated oven at 180C for 30 minutes. It should come out lovely and golden. Leave to cool in the tin for ten minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. Warm your additional agave or maple syrup (about 1-2 tbsp) until super runny. Poke the bread with a toothpick all over - not all the way through. Brush with the runny syrup. It makes the bread super glossy and extra delicious.

The bread is really light and I imagine you could easily jazz it up with some nuts, raisins, coconut, maca....maybe we will try and make a carrot version if any carrots survive in our house long enough not to be juiced. Or a beetroot and chocolate! Ok I'm getting carried away...but make this and eat it and feel better and know that spring is around the corner. I hope.

Baking and sunshine, sunshine and baking…probably my two bests in the whole world. Apart from maybe a very good margarita on a lovely evening with lovely friends. We're a week back from our yearly soaking of Vitamin D at my mama's beautiful little homestead in Spain. Whilst we were there we had a little birthday bash for my mama - al fresco pasta and sangria with the neighbours, who all brought drums and guitars and friends and kept us dancing under the shooting stars. I made a cake (of course), and took the excuse to make one I've been wanting to try out for ages. The original recipe is from the gorgeous Deliciously Ella, and I altered it slightly….and also somehow managed to make it without the luxury of a food processor, so mine was a bit lumpier but just as divine. It's completely gluten/sugar/dairy free and there wasn't a crumb left uneaten…I promise it tasted totally incredible. It's also quick and easy to make. Total winner.

Preheat the oven to 180C. Peel the sweet potatoes, chop into chunks and steam for about 20 mins, until they are really soft. In a large bowl, mix the ground almonds, flours, cacao, cinnamon and salt and set aside.

Prepare the icing by blitzing all the ingredients in a food processor until smooth and creamy. Or, in my case, pop them in some strange manual chopper and attempt to blitz them until they are as un-lumpy as you can manage… Pop the icing into a bowl, cover and keep in the fridge.

Place the soft, slightly cooled sweet potatoes, dates, vanilla bean seeds (scraped from the pod - discard the pod), maple syrup & water into a food processor or blender, and blend until smooth. Stir this into the dry ingredients until well combined. Prepare three 8" cake tins (I actually think this would be rad even taller in 6" tins, but that might just be me) by brushing with coconut oil and lining with parchment circles.

Sitting in the hot hot sun whilst you mix the cake is optional but really helps, I find...

Spoon the batter into three separate tins (I like to measure it out with scales to make sure all three have an even amount) and bake for about 20 mins, until a skewer comes out clean. Cool in the tins 20 mins, then invert onto a cooling rack until completely cool.

Chop your strawberries and layer your cake with strawberries and the creamy chocolate frosting. I sprinkled some lightly toasted slivered amends and desiccated coconut between the layers too, and topped the cake with more of those plus some yummy edible flowers. Keep in the fridge until serving. ENJOY! God I want to eat it again, right now…

For a few especially frantic, especially sleep-deprived weeks now Pablo has been on school dinners instead of packed lunch. Apart from apparently being pretty "cool" when you're 4, school dinners seem to have this amazing power to send him home at the end of the day starving hungry and with such miserably low blood sugar that I have regularly considered selling him to the nearest circus rather than hear one more second of whinge. Maybe this is because every day seems to be pasta, sweetcorn and jelly? Who knows, but it was evident that I had to man up and start packing a lunchbox again.

The worst bit about the lunchbox is the snacky bit. I don't like buying the palm-oil-filled overpriced kids' snacks from the supermarket, but I do love to bake…duh…so am always on the lookout for some kind of "healthy" treat that takes as little time as possible to whip up. I adapted this recipe from one by the insanely gorgeous Deliciously Ella, who is a goldmine of adventurous, nutritious ideas. And I promise these are totally yummy, and most importantly Pablo thought they were an actual brownie and felt like he was getting a really serious treat…when they are technically a health food. So, proceed….

Sweet Potato Brownies

Preheat the oven to 180C. Peel the sweet potatoes, cut them into chunks and steam them for about 25 minutes, until they are completely soft. Place them in a food processor with the dates and blend until smooth.

Add all the remaining ingredients to a bowl and fold in the potato/date goo. Fully line a tin (I went for 10x10 and you wouldn't want any bigger or the brownies will be too thin, unless you double the recipe) with baking parchment and spread in your mix as evenly as possible.

Bake the brownies for about 20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out dry. Let them mostly cool in the tin before removing and chopping them up. For a bit of added glamour I painted them with a dry brush and some edible bronze lustre - this is always a good tip for making brownies more fancy! If you do so, do it before you cut them up or you'll be in a world of stress.

Totally delicious, totally healthy…and also totally vegan, should you need that box ticked too. I might try adding some desiccated coconut next time… already planning a next time...

I seem to be a bit fickle with my lust for new things - sometimes there are so many gorgeous things out there that I could post ten crushes a week, but then…nothing…for months. Or I suddenly decide I just don't really want any new things, apart from a very very VERY long holiday in Mexico. So this can become Crush of the Now… for whenever I see something I can't resist.

At the moment it's What Mother Made - totally handmade and totally gorgeous kids clothes. I had an extremely hard time resisting some of their last collection on my weekly visits to Mother's Hub (E17 folk - beware, if you visit, it's FULL of irresistible small clothing), but these new Spring/Summer bits may be more than I can bear. Little colourful dungarees and crazy pantaloons that are perfect for summertime adventures. Now to find them in my size….

Happy birthday to King Squid, my lovely husband Konch. We made him a crazy little cake - chocolate chip funfetti sponges filled with peanut butter cream and vanilla cream frosting. I make cakes eternally but always much more fun to get the littles involved and go a bit bonkers. This time we cut shapes from fondant, left them to dry, then decorated them with edible markers and squished them around the cake. Yummy and fun and a big success…

Half term is always the best, apart from being about 5 weeks too short. And the fact that everyone else is on half term too, which means that anything even vaguely desirable to do in London is totally heaving and usually sold out 6 months before you've even thought of doing it. But despite this, we packed our sacks of snacks and braved a trip to the South Bank Imagine Children's Festival, not for the *awesome* Grandpa Joe's Giant Storytelling Bed for Roald Dahl tales & epic bouncing, because I absolutely didn't get my act together in time and it was long sold out. However, for mums like me there was the fabulous Land of Kids pop up - totally free and unbookable and all over the Royal Festival Hall. YAY!

After fighting through the swarms of toddlers and buggies and agitated mums to park up and feed our gaggle buns and grapes and sandwiches (and ourselves very large coffees) until everyone was on a lovely blood sugar high and ready to rock, we headed up to Pirate School and let them loose. I haven't laughed so much in a long time, as the pirates dressed even little Indy in bandanas, patches and gold then led them on a rampage around the room ("Captain's coming! Scrub the decks!" etc). Lost & Found are the force behind the pirates, and I hear they even do parties so get in touch! The kids were too exhausted afterwards to even face the magical cardboard city building that we'd stuck on the agenda next, but seeing the vast kid-crafted cardboard kingdom stretching across the floor was pretty magnificent. Then it was off to get amazing churros and visit the baby animal petting zoo, cleverly avoiding the face painting…